Norway slams Israel for jailing Palestinian kids

Norway’s new foreign minister has condemned Israel’s detention of Palestinian children as young as twelve as “completely unacceptable” and “a clear violation of international conventions”.

His comments came as he returned from his first trip to Israel, as part of a new round of peace talks aimed at resolving the long-running conflict.

“In the meeting I had with Secretary Avigdor Lieberman, I took up a number of human rights issues related to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank,” Børge Brende told NTB newswire.

“I also brought up Israel’s detention of Palestinian minors, which is a clear violation of international conventions.”

UNICEF, the United Nations body which works for children’s rights, issued a damning report earlier this year that claimed that up to 220 Palestinian children are held in Israeli jails at any one time, claiming they were subject to degrading treatment and even torture, and forced to signed confessions in order to be released.